The Festival
by SunnyBeaudelaire
Summary: Naomi and Effy are loving the summer so far. Drink, drugs, partying, camping...and of course a few new friends added to the mix.
1. Chapter 1

She opened her eyes carefully; the pounding in her head becoming more pronounced the more light was seeping through the thin tent walls. Squeezing her eyes tightly shut again, she slowly rubbed her temple with the tips of her fingers, assessing the damage. Another ripple of pain began at the front of her head and she groaned.

"Why. Why the actual fuck did I come here in the first place?" she muttered crossly, brushing peroxide strands from her forehead. She turned over, attempting to shield her eyes once again from the horrific laser beaming through the fabric. She flung her arms free from her suffocating sleeping bag, quickly checking the damage to the rest of her body. Satisfied that she was indeed still fully clothed, if not slightly disgusted by the mud caking her ankles, she lay down again. She quickly estimated that she would have at least an hour of undisturbed sleep before a certain bad influence would stumble back to the tent plot and demand to start the drinking once again.

A groan, almost mirroring her own, came from her left. She chuckled in the knowledge that at least her best friend, Effy, would be suffering just as much as she was this morning.

"Serves you fucking right, doesn't it. Starting on the fucking vodka at 10am yesterday. You're going to have to finish off that horrific mix you made yourself, Eff, seriously I don't have a clue what you put in there but I can't remember anything after grabbing the mic off that guy. Remember? Ugh, no, you probably wouldn't, you were too busy stealing the drummer's sticks. You'd better still have them. They were pretty cool guys, actually. Weren't they? Eff..? Effy?"

Naomi turned over fully to face the figure in the second sleeping bag. Her hood was up and she was curled into a ball, still groaning slightly, she seemed to be still half asleep. Naomi readied her attack, reasoning that if she had to suffer, everybody else would be suffering alongside her. She jabbed her companion's back, gently at first, but becoming harder and harder until she finally yanked the hood off, to reveal not the familiar untidy dark hair, but a mop of bright red.

The redhead shuffled in her sleeping bag until she turned over with her eyes still closed, to face Naomi. She mumbled something incoherent and seemed to be about to fall asleep again.

"You could've just like, shaken me or something. Didn't have to go poking people. M'totally gonna have a bruise. Fucking hell," the girl opened her eyes and blinked in the brightness coming through the tent.

Naomi hadn't moved since the realisation that she'd just spent the night in a tent with a complete stranger. She was staring at the girl in horror, completely frozen, her pounding hangover not letting her process the information fast enough.

The redhead, however, seemed to take in her surroundings relatively calmly. Her curious eyes surveyed her surroundings, a small frown appearing on her features. Finally, she seemed to come to a conclusion. She took a deep breath, let it out, and nodded to herself.

"This isn't my tent," she remarked to the roof. She blinked a few times.

"No," answered Naomi, slowly, as if she was speaking to a child.

"Is it yours?" asked the girl, turning to look at Naomi for the first time that morning. She had deep brown eyes, the kind that's difficult to look away from. This was the predicament Naomi found herself in now. She was staring at the girl unashamedly, unable to tear herself away from those oddly familiar eyes.

"I-um...I believe so, yes," she said this slowly, not entirely registering what she was being asked.

"Ah. It's lovely," the redhead nodded. She began to nibble at her fingernails, seemingly struggling with the situation as much as Naomi was.

"This is going to sound terrible, really it is. But, um...well. Do I know you?" Naomi could somehow sense that there was an underlying question hidden in that one, one that meant so much more than her mind could process right now.

"No. Um, no we don't. I mean, I don't. I mean you don't. Know you-me. We don't know each other, is what I'm trying to say, obviously," she stuttered. She put her nervousness down to the hangover, which in all honesty wasn't nearly as bad as she initially thought. She actually was starting to think that she was still quite drunk.

"Right, that makes more sense," the girl rationalised. "So, the question now arises. Well, a few questions, actually. Are we still in Builth Wells?"

Naomi chuckled. This girl honestly had even less of a clue what was going on than she did. They hadn't left the festival; that much she was sure of.

"No, we're still here, unless someone took out all the pegs and carried us to another county, or something, which I doubt, 'cause, y'know-" she was cut off by the girl untangling herself from her sleeping bag and crawling towards the entrance to the tent.

"What're you doing?" oddly, the thought that the girl might be leaving so soon disheartened her.

"Just checking," she peered through the zip, had a good look round and brought her head back in, ruffling her vibrant hair, making it even messier than it was before. "Yep, we're still here." She made her way back to the sleeping bag and sat on it, facing Naomi with her legs crossed, pulling her hoodie tighter.

"You didn't believe me?" Naomi smirked.

"I didn't believe that we would have even like, noticed if the tent had been fucking unpegged and carried to another bloody county, because frankly, my dear, we were totally wankered last night."

Naomi couldn't help it; she burst out in a fit of giggles, which she admittedly regretted quite considerably afterwards, due to the fresh wave of pounding that came with the laughter.

"What?" demanded the little redhead, though with a slight smile that indicated that she wasn't too insulted.

"It's just-hic- you don't seem the type to swear like that. You just-ha-and that hoodie!" a fresh wave of laughter hit her, and for the first time that morning her head stopped pounding. She fell backwards onto the sleeping bag and lay there clutching her stomach as the giggles just kept on coming.

The girl peered down at her scruffy black hoodie, written on it in big white lettering was 'Dip me in chocolate and feed me to the lesbians'. She started to chuckle along with the blonde girl, and soon they were both at their strange situation, unable to catch their breaths.

"Emily!" Naomi suddenly exclaimed.

"What?" yelled the girl, equally as excitedly.

"I remember your name!" Naomi had experienced a sudden and quite humorous flashback, involving her and her new friend being dragged from the stage by some very large men.

"Aw, that's not fair," Emily seemed genuinely disappointed that she couldn't remember the name of the girl lying opposite her. Suddenly a flash went across her eyes, and a small smile appeared. Naomi found she quite liked that smile.

"Wait, no...isn't it, like an actress. You have the same name as someone famous. Like, off TV. Right?" Naomi didn't have the heart to tell her new friend off for reminding her of her ridiculous name. Besides, if she just said her first name and didn't mention any angry models, Emily might never remember her surname.

"Yeah, Naomi," she smiled up at Emily, happy that she was beginning to remember bits from the night before. It had genuinely been a good night. She remembered flashes. She and Effy had lost their friend Cook at the beginning of the night, he was getting laid, as usual. They had made up several cocktails, each more deadly than the other, and began challenging people that they met to drinking games. She remembered meeting Emily and her friends, though she couldn't remember any details about them. The only thing after that was the stage, when they had decided the supporting artists were taking too long in the interval to tune their instruments, and had stormed the stage, attacking from all directions. Effy had made it to the drummer, instantly sitting on his lap she had started to bang the symbol in any old fashion. The drummer didn't seem to mind that much, in all honesty. Naomi had grabbed the mic off the lead singer and started yelling something about the government. She couldn't remember exactly, but she sincerely hoped that it had been filmed and was being shown to the prime minister now. Emily, if she was recalling correctly, had wandered relatively calmly onto the stage after the rest of the group and began spinning, her arms stretched right out and her head facing the open starry sky. She remembered the bass guitarist approaching Emily, holding her hands. That was when Naomi had dropped the mic, presumably she'd seen the security guards approaching and she wanted to grab Emily and the others and leg it. The last thing she could recall was holding hands with both Emily and Effy while they were being fireman lifted by the bouncers and carried back through the night.

The question was; what on earth had happened between being abandoned by the chuckling security guards and this morning? And where had Effy disappeared off to?


	2. Chapter 2

Omg. You guys are awesome thanks for the reviews, seriously. Omg. I'd like to offer something better than a shockingly short new chapter as an apology for the serious lack of updating, but alas, I have only my words to give you. So I hope you guys enjoy, let me know what you think yeah? There will be more, I kind of need some ideas about where this is gonna go though...fancy helping out?

Disclaimer- Skins is not mine, but the tent is.

Naomi looked at her new companion, Emily. It was such a strange situation. Here was this girl, who'd spent a few hours asleep next to her, who'd spent the entire night before dancing and hijacking stages with her, and yet she could honestly say that she knew nothing about her. Despite the increasingly frequent flashbacks, the only thing that Naomi could tell about the girl sitting cross-legged in front of her was that she had bright red hair, the deepest brown eyes she'd ever seen, and was very possibly a lesbian. These last two points were certainly something Naomi would have to approach in the near future, but for now she was content to chat with Emily about their wild night, swapping recollections between fits of giggles.

"So, you met Effy then?" Naomi was trying to fit the events of the night into some sort of timeline.

"Yeah, definitely. Dark hair, smokes a lot, drinks even more than me," Emily smirked, chewing on a toggle from her hoodie; something Naomi found extremely alluring. She shook her head, the alcohol couldn't have worn off yet.

Naomi sniggered. She wondered what kind of impression her best friend had left on Emily. She found that most would shy away from Effy's calculating stares, but Emily spoke of her with nothing other than quiet amusement. Naomi bit her lip, Emily must have been an extremely good drinking companion last night to earn even a conversation with the mysterious brunette.

"Anyway, I should probably head off," Emily started, looking around the dishevelled sheets absent-mindedly, presumably looking for her possessions.

"You don't have to go-," Naomi began, eager to keep talking to her new friend, still yearning to uncover the events of the previous night. She stopped herself from finishing that sentence though, a blush rising in her pale cheeks. She wanted nothing more than to adopt Effy's alluringly indifferent demeanour at that point, her pride wanting to keep Emily in the tent without actually expressing the desire in words.

"It's okay, my friends are probably wondering where I am, my sister not so much," she frowned, getting to knees ready to crawl out of the entrance of the tent. "Maxxie'll be worried though, last time I saw him he was helping some people escape from a mosh pit. He had a black eye, too, I hope he's okay-" Emily stopped, seemingly lost in her own thoughts, and pulled her bottom lip between her teeth.

"Em," Naomi waved a hand in front of Emily's face, causing both girls to start giggling once again. They looked at each other for a moment, a slight smile on both of their faces, content with the ease that they felt in each other's company, though they had only known each other soberly for around an hour.

Emily finally crawled out of the tent, Naomi following after a taking a deep breath to rearrange her thoughts. She stood up after exiting the tent, her hands wet from the dew that had settled on the grass overnight. She took another deep breath, hoping that the crisp air would clear her alcohol induced haziness. The result was quite the opposite however, as she instead inhaled a lot of cigarette smoke. She let out a whooping cough which led to a full blown coughing fit. Emily was laughing again, patting her on the back as gently as she could through the tears of laughter threatening to fall from her beautiful eyes. Naomi sat on the floor grumpily, letting the last few coughs get the better of her as she peered up through streaming eyes at her attacker. She narrowed her eyes at her smirking best friend, lazily puffing away on the cancer stick that Naomi had almost just swallowed.

"Good morning to you, too," Effy smiled condescendingly at Naomi, turning her eyes towards Emily instead. Her eyes gave nothing but genuine curiosity away.

"Stop sneaking up on people," Naomi muttered, secretly glad that her best friend was back. The prospect of looking for her in the maze of tents and caravans that was the campsite was not appealing.

"Anyway, I should go. I'll see you soon, Naomi. Glad to see you made it back alive, Effy," Emily winked at Naomi and walked away, stumbling slightly over the various tent pegs and empty bottles scattered around the field.

"Likewise," Effy said under her breath, turning her attention from the redhead's retreating figure to the girl sitting cross legged on the floor in front of her, who didn't seem to be able to tear her eyes away from the now distant Emily.

Effy cleared her throat loudly and sat directly in front of Naomi, causing the blonde to slowly turn her eyes towards the other girl, a guilty look crossing her features.

"So, alive and well, huh?" Naomi teased Effy and grabbed a newly lit cigarette from the brunette's mouth before she could take drag out of it. She welcomed the rush of nicotine, quietly hoping that it would restore some of her natural attitude, which for some reason did not seem to be making an appearance this morning.

Effy smirked across at Naomi, seeing right through her as usual. In true Effy style, however, she did not approach the subject they both knew was hovering in the air beside them, like some kind of invisible elephant growing larger and larger. Instead, she chucked Naomi a t-shirt, handed her a coca-cola bottle filled with something distinctly green, and winked.

"Put that on, your shirt looks like you've had sex in it," she pointed at the band t-shirt Naomi was now holding across her lap like a precious genie bottle. The blonde slowly looked up at her friend in awe, gesturing to the t-shirt dumbly, unable to form words.

"Yes, I know it's your favourite band, you can thank me after you've gotten dressed, put some deodorant on, and downed that bottle," Effy stood without a word and began walking away again, her slender legs showing through the rips in her jeans.

"Wait, where're you going?" demanded Naomi, she was not prepared to be left alone in this campsite, especially after sniffing the green liquid she was supposed to be drinking.

"I'm going to get you a burger, you're going to drink that, and then we're heading to a friend's caravan," she stated, not even looking behind her at Naomi's reaction to the day's planned activities. Naomi shrugged and set about her tasks, she needed to get back to some level ground after the strange morning she'd had. Downing half a pint of something unknown before noon and going to some stranger's caravan made complete sense to her; the feelings that Emily had sparked however, did not.


	3. Chapter 3

**I'd completely forgotten that I'd ever written this story and can't even find it on my laptop anymore, but I just found it again and am mildly impressed with 17yr old me so now 20yr old me will try to live up to the first two chapters. Yay.**

**I don't own skins and I don't even own the tent anymore.**

Naomi stumbled out of the tent half an hour later, feeling slightly fresher wearing some deodorant and her brand new Imagine Dragons t-shirt. She wondered if it was stolen, and concluded that Effy had means that were not to be questioned, not when band t-shirts were involved.

She leaned down to put on her wellies and immediately regretted the decision as the entire world started spinning and the ground suddenly became a lot closer to her face. She heard a bark of hooting laughter coming from somewhere and looked up to see one of her best friends, Cook, sauntering over half dressed and pointing at her lying in the grass.

"Naomikins, seriously mate you don't need to curtsey every time you see the Cookie monster alright?" he was still chortling as he wiped his hands on his already filthy polo shirt and stuck one out to help her up.

"No, leave me here," Noami moaned dramatically, clutching blades of grass to try to stop herself from falling off the edge of the earth. She closed her eyes to shield from the searing sun, which she realised too late was a terrible mistake around James Cook as she suddenly felt as though she'd plummeted into the Atlantic as he upended the ice water bucket where they kept their beer bottles onto her head. She paused for a second to gain her breathing capabilities back and then let out a blood curdling scream. She sprang to her feet, only stumbling slightly as the alcohol still in her system threatened to make a reappearance and lunged at her friend, catching him around the neck and managing to leap onto his back. He started running with her still clinging onto him, pounding every bit of his body she could reach and spraying water everywhere.

Emily heard the screams and looked out of her caravan window to see the funny blonde girl she'd shared a tent with last night, dripping wet, on the back of what looked like a man but certainly ran like some kind of monkey. He was spinning and jumping and roaring with laughter. Naomi too was giggling between her insults and screams, hair flowing everywhere and drips cascading down her body and onto the grass around them. She really did look beautiful, Emily thought, with the sun bouncing off her soaking blonde hair, a radiant smile stuck on her face as she shrieked with laughter.

"Ems are you even listening to me?" a demanding voice brought her attention back to her own caravan with a jolt. Her twin sister was clicking her fingers in front of Emily's face as though she was a disobedient child.

"What, Katie?" Emily asked, as annoyed at her sister's attitude as she had been her entire life. Her mother had been agonisingly clear as to the conditions of them attending the festival this year. _"You will not allow unruly, dangerous boys into your caravan; no matter how attractive you think they are or what football team they claim to play for. You will not take drugs of any kind. You will ring me every single morning without fail and so help you God if I can hear you slurring. And of course, you will stay together and look after each other like the loving sisters you always have been." _They had so far stuck to only one of those conditions, and it was incredibly lucky that both of them were skilled at imitating each other's voices.

"I had to cover for you this morning _again_. Where were you? And don't you dare say you were with Maxxie because I saw him this morning and he told me-"

"Calm down Katie. Her name was Naomi," Emily declared, trying to tune out her sister's agonizingly whiny voice. She threw a suddenly silent Katie a quick wink and started towards the cupboard to get changed. She waded through the sea of empty beer bottles and crisp packets, rubbed a smear of lipstick off the mirror and started trying to open the door to where they kept the little clothes they brought with them.

"I wish you wouldn't wear that top, you look ridiculous," huffed Katie with her arms crossed, frowning at her sister's choice of clothes. Emily glanced down at her favourite hoodie and smirked. Her sister's disapproval of her lifestyle only made her want to express it more. She continued tugging at the cupboard door, it seemed to be stuck from the amount of crap there was scattered on the floor. She gave it one last pull and it miraculously popped open, revealing a decidedly naked young man covered in what she could only hope was chocolate spread, snoring softly on the floor.

Emily turned to Katie with a look of disgust, which was received by a mere shrug and a toss of her darker red hair as she stood and sauntered out the door. "I'm telling you babes, you look ridiculous. Change yeah?"

"_I'm _ridiculous? Katie, there's a naked man in here every single fucking morning," Emily sighed before lightly kicking their unwelcome guest. She smirked and called after her sister, "And I'm pretty sure his balls are on your moisturiser?"

"What the _fuck?_ Get him the _fuck _out of our cupboard!" Katie came flying back into the caravan and grabbed the poor boy by his hair before dragging him out, yelling in a way that only Katie Fitch can. Emily chuckled, Katie was so predictable. She knew exactly how to push her buttons, often knew what she was going to do before she did it. It wasn't just because they were twins; Emily was a people-watcher. She was good at understanding people, at predicting their next move, and that's why the mysterious Naomi intrigued her so much. She wanted to know things about this girl, and wished she could recall more of their conversation last night.

Before she could fall too much into her memory, she was startled by a handsome blonde boy leaping through the door and onto the bed.

"Alright Em? That's a cracking hoodie you got there, must have been a hell of a good friend got you that," he winked before producing a spliff from his pocket, lighting it, and handing it to her. Maxxie had been Emily's best friend for a couple of years. He was a year older and had introduced her to all things gay, much to Katie's horror. Mrs Fitch adored Maxxie and would never give up on the idea that he and Emily would somehow end up married with beautiful, blonde, tap-dancing babies.

"And what the fuck happened to you last night?" Emily mock-demanded. She could remember very little of the night in all honesty, only that they'd begun drinking and smoking together. She'd taken a pill from one of Maxxie's friends, who'd then proceeded to straddle her best friend, cueing her hasty departure. Next time she'd seen Maxxie, he was running into a mosh pit, already sporting a dark blue bruise under his eye.

"Me? You're the one that ended up on stage with that girl preaching about fucking university fees," he snatched the spliff from her and took a long drag, styling his bleached hair in the cracked, stained mirror. Emily narrowed her eyes at him, already knowing from the blush spreading across his cheeks what he was going to say. "Alright, alright, I went back with James didn't I," he admitted, throwing himself back down onto the bed with a small smile. Emily chuckled, but stopped when his smile started to fade.

"Em," he began, biting his lip carefully. She groaned. As always, she knew exactly what was coming next.

"She's here isn't she?" It wasn't really a question. Emily wasn't surprised when Maxxie nodded, holding out the rest of the spliff to her with a small apologetic smile.

"Well I'm not going to let her ruin a perfectly good holiday. Come on," she started filling up plastic bottles with vodka, rum, and anything else she could find; they'd need a lot if they were starting this early in the morning. "Let's get fucked."


End file.
